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The Pianist

4.25 of 5 stars 4.25 · rating details · 14,060 ratings · 376 reviews

The last live broadcast on Polish Radio, on September 23, 1939, was Chopin's Nocturne in C# Minor, played by a young pianist named Wladyslaw Szpilman, until his playing was interrupted by German shelling. It was the same piece and the same pianist, when broadcasting resumed six years later. The Pianist is Szpilman's account of the years inbetween, of the death and cruelty...more The last live broadcast on Polish Radio, on September 23, 1939, was Chopin's Nocturne in C# Minor, played by a young pianist named Wladyslaw Szpilman, until his playing was interrupted by German shelling. It was the same piece and the same pianist, when broadcasting resumed six years later. The Pianist is Szpilman's account of the years inbetween, of the death and cruelty inflicted on the Jews of Warsaw and on Warsaw itself, related with a dispassionate restraint borne of shock. Szpilman, now 88, has not looked at his description since he wrote it in 1946 (the same time as Primo Levi's If This Is A Man?; it is too personally painful. The rest of us have no such excuse.

Szpilman's family were deported to Treblinka, where they were exterminated; he survived only because a music-loving policeman recognised him. This was only the first in a series of fatefully lucky escapes that littered his life as he hid among the rubble and corpses of the Warsaw Ghetto, growing thinner and hungrier, yet condemned to live. Ironically it was a German officer, Wilm Hosenfeld, who saved Szpilman's life by bringing food and an eiderdown to the derelict ruin where he discovered him. Hosenfeld died seven years later in a Stalingrad labour camp, but portions of his diary, reprinted here, tell of his outraged incomprehension of the madness and evil he witnessed, thereby establishing an effective counterpoint to ground the nightmarish vision of the pianist in a desperate reality. Szpilman originally published his account in Poland in 1946, but it was almost immediately withdrawn by Stalin's Polish minions as it unashamedly described collaborations by Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Poles and Jews with the Nazis. In 1997 it was published in Germany after Szpilman's son found it on his father's bookcase. This admirably robust translation by Anthea Bell is the first in the English language. There were 3,500,000 Jews in Poland before the Nazi occupation; after it there were 240,000. Wladyslaw Szpilman's extraordinary account of his own miraculous survival offers a voice across the years for the faceless millions who lost their lives. --David Vincent

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Hardcover, 222 pages

Published 1999 by Victor Gollancz (first published 1946)

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Apr 15, 2011 Jeanette rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: biography-memoir, europe-and-british-isles, five-star-nonfiction, history, nonfiction, world-war-two-nonfiction

I've read a lot about World War II, but I'd never fully grasped the complete destruction, the utter devastation of the city of Warsaw. Hitler was like a bratty child with a toy he'd rather destroy than share with anyone else. When he knew he was going to lose the war, he ordered that Warsaw be reduced to rubble. Among the ruins there was a Jewish musician named Wladyslaw Szpilman who had managed to survive for six years, and a German named Wilm Hosenfeld who saved Szpilman's life one last time....more

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Nov 03, 2011 Ryan rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wladyslaw Szpilman was a trained pianist, a Pole, and a Jew, and in The Pianist, he explains how he survived World War II in the Warsaw Ghetto. It sounds like the sort of book you'd want your kids to read in high school, so I was surprised to learn that The Pianist was a "banned" book.

You can believe the subtitle: this memoir of "one man's survival" is indeed extraordinary. The Jews within the ghetto were killed by the German police, they died of hunger, and they were gathered into cattle cars a...more Wladyslaw Szpilman was a trained pianist, a Pole, and a Jew, and in The Pianist, he explains how he survived World War II in the Warsaw Ghetto. It sounds like the sort of book you'd want your kids to read in high school, so I was surprised to learn that The Pianist was a "banned" book.

You can believe the subtitle: this memoir of "one man's survival" is indeed extraordinary. The Jews within the ghetto were killed by the German police, they died of hunger, and they were gathered into cattle cars and taken to concentration and death camps. This last happened to Szpilman's family. Survivors did mount a resistance, and they too were killed. I'd read about all of these things before and had even seen many of them mentioned directly or indirectly in films, but Szpilman's account is nevertheless quite moving. Szpilman's son writes in the Foreward that his father must have been searching for answers while writing this book immediately after the war. However, Szpilman resists the urge to search for answers in his writing, choosing instead to share what he witnessed and endured.

I think his account of the typhus epidemic will stay with me for a long time. Szpilman recalls that, at one point, as many as 5000 people died of typhus per month. Lice, he explains, were everywhere in the ghetto, and each louse could potentially carry the disease. Before he could come into his family's apartment, Szpilman's mother would inspect his clothing, remove the lice, and drown them in a bowl of spirits. In spite of precautions like these, the dead piled up in the streets faster than they could be taken away, and although this was the "modern age," it was still a time when you walked to work each day. Szpilman did, and this is arguably not the worst thing that he saw.

I wonder whether anyone but a survivor could imagine the details Szpilman shares. For example, the disease was on everyone's mind, which we might expect. Szpilman goes on to explain how the poor wondered when they would die of typhus and the rich planned how they could obtain a vaccination against it. Though Szpilman did not come from a rich family, his profession did bring him into contact with that class. He explains how they would enter the cafe where he played and discuss business and their smuggling operations. They did not believe in charity, Szpilman explains, because "if you worked as hard as they did then you would earn as much too: it was open to everyone to do so, and if you didn’t know how to get on in life that was your own fault." Although we hear a similar refrain from the wealthy today, I was surprised to hear these statements coming out of the Warsaw ghetto in the midst of the Holocaust. Stories like these do little to add to our faith in humanity, do they. However, there are moments of great courage and compassion in this text.

It is not uncommon to hear people consider what lessons or realizations we should take away from accounts like Szpilman's. Although our need to make sense of stories like these is understandable, perhaps our desire to find a simple narrative should give us pause, particularly in light of The Pianist's publication history.

Szpilman published The Pianist in 1946, under the title "Death of a City." Szpilman's son explains in the Foreword how this book was not published again for another fifty years, saying only that the Soviet "authorities had their reasons" for rejecting it. Wolf Biermann's note in the Epilogue goes on to explain that books like this "contained too many painful truths about the collaboration of defeated Russians, Poles, Ukrainians, Latvians and Jews with the German Nazis. Even in Israel, people did not want to hear about such things." I was surprised to read this, but Szpilman's description of the Jewish police within the ghetto comes to mind.

“You could have said, perhaps, that they had caught the Gestapo spirit. As soon as they put on their uniforms and police caps and picked up their rubber truncheons, their natures changed … That did not prevent them from forming a police jazz band which, incidentally, was excellent.”

Szpilman's memoir contains many such moments of bitter irony. The Pianist is not a book that will allow us to sit comfortably with our easy answers to life's questions. For example, Szpilman was saved by a German captain near the end of the war. Captain Wilm Hosenfeld feels that God intended for them to survive "in this inferno for five years," but after the war he was detained as a criminal and sent away to die in a Soviet internment camp.

I found The Pianist a remarkably powerful read. It is one of those rare memoirs that should not only be read because we'd like our children to learn Szpilman's experiences, but also because it is very well written. I recommend it.(less)

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Nov 01, 2012 pax rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012, non-fiction, lit-czech-hungary-poland, jewish, favs-and-recs, memorable-foreword-or-afterword

Das ist kein einfaches Buch zu lesen, sowohl inhaltlich als auch von der Schreibweise her: hier schreibt kein Schriftsteller, sondern ein Augenzeuge, der sich darum bemüht, etwas kaum fassbares in Worte zu fassen. Manchmal scheitert er, weil vieles eben nicht vermittelbar ist, ohne es selbst erlebt zu haben (und dies wünscht man niemandem) - manchmal reicht ein Wort, eine Satz, um den Leser unaussagbares spüren zu lassen. Deswegen: Lest es! Auch wenn es keine schriftstellerische Meisterleistung...more

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Feb 22, 2008 RJ Corby rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I became interested in reading "The Pianist" after seeing the excellent movie, directed by Roman Polanski, that was based on the book. After thoroughly enjoying the movie, I had very high hopes for this tome, and I was not disappointed. This book is a stunner, bringing to life the horrific conditions and brutality that Wladyslaw Szpilman endured to survive six years of Nazi brutality in Warsaw, Poland.

What's truly amazing about this book is how Szpilman tells the story with a sense of detachment...more I became interested in reading "The Pianist" after seeing the excellent movie, directed by Roman Polanski, that was based on the book. After thoroughly enjoying the movie, I had very high hopes for this tome, and I was not disappointed. This book is a stunner, bringing to life the horrific conditions and brutality that Wladyslaw Szpilman endured to survive six years of Nazi brutality in Warsaw, Poland.

What's truly amazing about this book is how Szpilman tells the story with a sense of detachment - the barbaric killing that he sees up close; his final moments with his family, when he realizes shortly after they are gone that will never see them again; his bearing witness to the piles and piles of corpses; and mindless executions for some minor infraction, etc. Szpilman writes it all in stunning, unforgettable prose. It baffles the mind how he was able to keep his wits about him and survive after suffering and witnessing such unspeakable horrors at the hands of such barbarians, and in the end his survival may well have hinged on the kindness of a Nazi Captain, Wilm Hosenfeld.

The fact that a Nazi helped him live is too unbelievable to be fiction after all that Szpilman had witnessed and endured - it must be true, and this story is. The Pianist is a remarkable story that will be every bit as powerful hundreds of years from now. The Washington Post calls this book "historically indispensable," and that is right on the mark. The book sits along side Anne Frank's tome as required Holocaust reading.

Adding excerpts of Hosenfeld's diary at the end of the book makes this read all the more powerful. Hosenfeld's story is an amazing one, which reminded me of Oskar Schindler, since he, like Schindler, did much to save many Jews. Hosenfeld's diary entries in the back of the book add much to the story and torpedoes the assumption that every single Nazi had no heart and enjoyed the killings (although an overwhelming majority did, in this reviewer's opinion).

This book is invaluable to Holocaust scholars and World War II students alike. And since I watched the movie before I read the book, I can attest that the movie was right on the mark in terms of accuracy. Very highly recommended reading. (Orig. Review - Dec. '04)(less)

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Feb 24, 2013 Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: World War II Buffs, Military buffs, History students

Recommended to Michael by: Chad Bryant

Shelves: fascism, memoirs

Although I'm a serious student of fascist history, I don't read many Holocaust memoirs. For one thing, I'm more inclined to understand these events from a more scholarly angle, through secondary studies. For another, I'm really more interested in the mindset and motivations of the perpetrators than the victims - the victims are just people like anyone, caught in a terrible situation, while the perpetrators are the ones who require some serious analysis to figure out. Finally, when it really come...more Although I'm a serious student of fascist history, I don't read many Holocaust memoirs. For one thing, I'm more inclined to understand these events from a more scholarly angle, through secondary studies. For another, I'm really more interested in the mindset and motivations of the perpetrators than the victims - the victims are just people like anyone, caught in a terrible situation, while the perpetrators are the ones who require some serious analysis to figure out. Finally, when it really comes down to it, the details of the lives of victims, even the ones who managed to survive, are depressing, and I don't read history to feel depressed.

That said, first-hand accounts of the persecution of Jews and other groups during the Polish occupation are clearly important source material, and occasionally a memoir is interesting enough on its own to make good reading as well. Szpilman’s book is one of those rare cases in which the author’s story as well as story-telling abilities transcend the grimness of much of the surroundings to make a compelling read. You go into the story knowing that he’ll live, but at times you really don’t see how, and pretty much everyone else he encounters winds up dead. Remarkably, a great many of them feel, because he is a great artist, that it’s more important for him to survive than themselves, but he never lets this go to his head, he remains humble in his own self-perception (although obviously wanting to survive) throughout.

It may be the case that he wrote this out of a sense of obligation to the many people who died that he might live. Apparently he wrote it soon after the War, then tucked it away where his son would never see it during his lifetime, after a brief and quickly suppressed publication in the forties. A lot of the notes I took while reading it were speculations about what the Communist Polish authorities, or their Soviet masters, might have found objectionable about the book. Also, I noted several points at which Szpilman goes out of his way to say nice things about Socialists or Russian soldiers, I suspect as attempts to appeal to those very forces. It’s hard to say why it was buried, although the fact that a (presumably fascist) German officer is the last person to save Szpilman’s life near the end of the book might have been a factor.

Since its republication, the book has been made into a movie directed by Roman Polanski. As far as I recall, it had a few minor changes, but was quite close to the book, if not quite as desperately loyal as Polanski’s version of Rosemary's Baby. For those without the patience to read the book, the film is certainly one of the better that covers the history of the Holocaust.(less)

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Jan 17, 2013 Ashley Rodriguez rated it 4 of 5 stars

The Pianist is about one man’s experience of the Holocaust. The man’s name is Wladyslaw Szpilman. He was Jewish and a pianist. He was able to survive the holocaust. The book is told from his point of view. The Pianist is an autobiography. It follows him from when the war starts and the war ends. He gets pushed into a ghetto, his family gets sent to an extermination camp, and he participates in the Warsaw Uprising. He gets into hiding where he always has to be on the move. He then meets a German...more

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Jan 11, 2013 Lisa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: poland, historical-fiction, holocaust, audio-book, library-book-or-loan

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I did not realise when I borrowed this audio-book from the library that it was the book on which the Oscar-winning film was made, but it turned out to be rivetting. The Pianist: the Extraordinary True Story of One Man’s Survival in Warsaw: 1939-1945 is the true story of Wladyslaw Szpilman who survived the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto through extraordinary luck.

Luck seems to be an inappropriate word to use in this context, and yet I have seen so many writers documenting the Holocaust, from Pr...more

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Oct 08, 2012 Mark Rossiter rated it 5 of 5 stars

This autobiographical tale by Władysław Szpilman is another staggering account of the holocaust, this one by a Polish Jew. A nationally known concert pianist living in a Jewish area of Warsaw with his parents, brother and two sisters, after the Germans invade they are gradually forced into greater and greater deprivation, until they are sent to the rounding-up area to be deported to – we now know – Treblinka. Just as they are about to board the infamous cattle cars, the author is pulled out of t...more

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Sep 21, 2012 Tony rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: ww2

What the Nazis did in the Second World War has always been of particular fascination to me, but I genuinely don't think I've been as moved by an account of German atrocities through this conflict as I was reading The Pianist. Wladislaw Spilzman's memoir is a harrowing tale of Polish and Jewish life right at the heart of where war began - as powerful a novel as you're likely ever to read.

You would have to be bereft of a certain humanity not to be a little heart broken by what Spilzman describes h...more

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Aug 21, 2012 Marie rated it 5 of 5 stars

I read this book several years ago, but recently purchased my own copy and read it again last summer. This first-hand account of the Jewish pianist, Wladyslaw Szpilman, provided me with valuable information regarding Warsaw, its people, and the events leading up to the Warsaw Rising of 1944. The book surprised me when I got to the end, because this 1999 version published by Picador included extracts from the diary of Captain Wilm Hosenfeld, the German soldier who discovered Szpilman hiding in an...more

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Aug 09, 2012 Terry Cornell rated it 5 of 5 stars

When writing a book review, I ask myself if the material is worthy enough to encourage others to read it. In this case, I wonder if I’m worthy enough to express the heart, tragedy, horror, and beauty of this classic Holocaust memoir. Its truths, both chilling and inspiring, make us question ourselves in an unsettled world.

In The Pianist, written in 1945 just after World War II, Wladyslaw Szpilman chronicles life and death in Warsaw during the German occupation. The book’s intensity makes it a su...more When writing a book review, I ask myself if the material is worthy enough to encourage others to read it. In this case, I wonder if I’m worthy enough to express the heart, tragedy, horror, and beauty of this classic Holocaust memoir. Its truths, both chilling and inspiring, make us question ourselves in an unsettled world.

In The Pianist, written in 1945 just after World War II, Wladyslaw Szpilman chronicles life and death in Warsaw during the German occupation. The book’s intensity makes it a surprisingly quick read. Szpilman, a Jewish concert pianist, had studied in Poland and Germany. When Adolf Hitler gained power, Szpilman returned to his native Poland and worked for Polish Radio until the German invasion. Szpilman was playing Chopin’s Lento con gran espressione when German bombs knocked Polish Radio off the air.

With a tone of detached understatement, Szpilman brings the reader into the Warsaw ghetto to experience mundane daily existence mixed with the monstrosity of Nazi atrocities. As the stranglehold of German control intensifies to the point of transporting Jews to the Treblinka extermination camp, we see ordinary people driven to desperation while trying to survive. Some collaborate with the Germans, hoping to postpone their demise. Others seem to meet death willingly at Treblinka, still hoping for a miracle. A comparative few try to fight back. Miraculously, Szpilman survives through luck, compassion from fellow Jews, Poles…and one German officer, Captain Wilm Hosenfeld. At the war’s end, Szpilman reopens Polish Radio playing the Chopin piece he was performing live when Warsaw fell.

Originally published in Poland in 1946 as Death of a City, the book was immediately withdrawn from circulation and suppressed by Communist authorities through the 1960s. In 1998, Szpilman’s son Andrezj republished it in German, and an English version soon followed. The book has now been published in more than 30 languages. The current edition includes a forward by Szpilman’s son, excerpts from the diary of Captain Hosenfeld and, most importantly, a fascinating epilogue by German poet Wolf Biermann, son of a resistance fighter and friend of Wladyslaw. This provides more information on the pianist’s later life and tells the incredible story of Captain Hosenfeld’s efforts to save Jews during the war.

Roman Polanski’s 2002 film, The Pianist, with an Oscar-winning portrayal of Szpilman by Adrien Brody, captures the essence of one man’s struggle to survive in the Warsaw ghetto. But Wladyslaw Szpilman’s powerful memoir provides a greater understanding of his experience and that of the heroic Captain Hosenfeld.

Before the German invasion of Poland, 3.5 million Jews lived there. Only 240,000 survived the Nazis. We see the Poles’ disbelief when the invasion starts, their hope for salvation crushed when France is defeated, and Polish Jews left at the mercy of a group of people who simply want them gone. If or when we’re faced with this kind of conflict in our world again, how will we react? Whether we are victims, bystanders, or part of the new regime, what will we, as individuals, do?(less)

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Jun 21, 2012 Phyllis rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A very sorrowful book. I don't know if today's generation of young people can appreciate the horrors of that time given all the Hollywood movies and their special effects and all the violent games for play. For me the violence wasn't the worst part; the most chilling part was neighbor turned against neighbor, family member against family member, adults against children, people against other people justifying what they were doing for more than survival, for pleasure, for purpose, for a larger des...more

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Mar 27, 2012 Marleen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wladyslaw Szpilman was a 28 year old Jewish man when Germany invaded Poland and subsequently turned part of Warsaw into a Jewish ghetto.
Szpilman was a concert pianist and composer and for a long time his work as a pianist in café’s in Warsaw was the only income his family had.
Until the summer of 1942, Szpilman and his parents and three siblings lived together. By the end of that summer the German occupiers decided to clear the ghetto and in a short time and with the use of lots of horrific viol...more Wladyslaw Szpilman was a 28 year old Jewish man when Germany invaded Poland and subsequently turned part of Warsaw into a Jewish ghetto.
Szpilman was a concert pianist and composer and for a long time his work as a pianist in café’s in Warsaw was the only income his family had.
Until the summer of 1942, Szpilman and his parents and three siblings lived together. By the end of that summer the German occupiers decided to clear the ghetto and in a short time and with the use of lots of horrific violence the fast majority of Jews were deported by train.
While Szpilman was able to postpone the inevitable for a little while for his family, it was only a matter of time before they too found themselves in the “Umschlagplatz”, waiting to be forced onto cattle trucks. Szpilman is separated from his family at the crucial moment and able to flee the deportation area while his family disappears from his life, never to be seen again.
For Szpilman this heralds the start of three years of fleeing, hiding and fear. Dependent on friends from his pre-war life, his instincts and pure luck he manages to keep himself alive and undetected until the very last days of the occupation of Warsaw.
When he at last does run into a German officer during those last days he once again is very lucky. Captain Wilm Hosenfeld has had his doubts about the war, the German cause and the prosecution of Jews and others for years. Hosenfeld puts Szpilman in a more or less secure hiding place and provides him with the food he needs to survive a bit longer. In doing so, he provides Szpilman with what he needs in order to survive until the end of the occupation, giving him a chance to create a life for himself once again.

This is a heartbreaking story, filled with horrific images told in a detached way, more as if written by an uninvolved outsider than by someone who lived through it.
The tone of the book is such that I found myself almost accepting the brutalities, prosecutions and devastation as a normal occurrence. It was only when I put the book down and allowed my mind to wander that the true horror of everything I’d just read really hit home.
It is telling that normal life seems to continue despite the horror and the madness of the Warsaw ghetto. In the midst of persecution by the Germans, Wladyslaw and his brother Henryk have “normal” sibling fights. In the same way the excitement Wladyslaw feels about holding an anniversary concert in the ghetto seems out of place yet indicates how the human mind will cling to normality in order to be able to survive the unimaginable.
And the will and ability of the human body and spirit to survive almost anything is astounding. How Szpilman didn’t just give up and lay himself down to die is completely beyond me. I guess though that no one can know what they would be capable of until they find themselves in circumstances making it necessary to discover the limits of their ability to endure. I can only hope and pray that I will never find myself in such circumstances.

I’m glad that Szpilman’s last life-line was provided by a German officer. It is so easy to think about that period of human history and just assume that all Germans were despicable creatures. But even during the nightmare that was Nazi Germany things were never that black and white, and it is good to see that message in writing. It is telling though that in the first edition of this book Hosenfeld was identified as Austrian rather than German. I guess people in Poland weren’t ready to think of any German as being essentially human in the days immediately after the war.
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Mar 14, 2012 Evelyn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is a memoir written by Wladislaw Szpilman of his experiences during World War II. It was not written with the object of publication, but rather as a way to record and sort through his feelings. But this was not a place that Szpilman vented his frustrations or anger. In the Epilogue, Wolf Biermann writes, "Readers will notice that although this book was written amidst the still smouldering ashes of the Second World War, its language is surprisingly cool. Wladislaw Szpliman describes his...more

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Feb 17, 2012 John rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wladyslaw Szpilman wrote this book with surprising dispassion and more like a journal than a novel. Written shortly after the War in 1946, his memory was fresh in relating the story of his families life in the Warsaw Ghetto and ultimately their loss when herded onto a train for an unknown fate and destination. On that same walk to the train Szpilman was jerked out of line by a Jewish policeman, escaped from the Ghetto and subsequently spent the next two and a half years eluding the exigencies of...more Wladyslaw Szpilman wrote this book with surprising dispassion and more like a journal than a novel. Written shortly after the War in 1946, his memory was fresh in relating the story of his families life in the Warsaw Ghetto and ultimately their loss when herded onto a train for an unknown fate and destination. On that same walk to the train Szpilman was jerked out of line by a Jewish policeman, escaped from the Ghetto and subsequently spent the next two and a half years eluding the exigencies of the Nazi's "Final Solution." Throughout his ordeal he was assisted by the Polish Resistance at great risk and in the end by a Wehrmacht Captain, Wilm Hosenfeld. Ultimately about 400,000 Jews were either murdered or transported from the Ghetto to the extermination camps and in mid 1943 the area was destroyed and completely leveled by the Germans. Extracts from the diary of Hosenfeld at the back of the book were an interesting revelation and provided a ray of goodness from the German perspective.

After finishing the book I rented the movie of the same title which I had originally seen in 2002. While we use our imagination to construct a book in our minds, a remarkable movie can produce a story more vivid and a reality more stark. In fact, this may be one of those rare situations where the move was as good, if not better, than the book.

Frederic Chopin's music was a constant theme of Szpilman's life and survival and he was playing "Nocturne in C - sharp Minor" on Polish Radio when the War suddenly reached Warsaw. Chopin, Poland and the War at large are framed in four quick movie scenes of dramatic irony and whose significance I did not fully appreciate nor remember in 2002 as I had not yet been to Poland. Later, while walking on Krakowskie Przedmiescie Street in Warsaw on a vacation in 2006, I found myself drawn to a striking sculpture of Christ bearing his cross that stood at the main entrance of the Church of the Holy Cross. This statute is silhouetted in the foreground of the four scenes with the progress of the War reflected in the background -- although the statue of Copernicus in the plaza across the street is replaced by damaged buildings in the last two scenes. In the final scene the catastrophe to Western Civilization is symbolized by the toppled sculpture lying prone amid the ruins.

Fittingly, Frederic Chopin's heart rests in an urn in a pillar of this Church!!!.......while the rest of his remains are buried in Paris.

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Feb 09, 2012 Karo rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: manfic, memoir

I read The Pianist in the original Polish, but the book will read well in any language. As Szpilman's son writes in the preface to the book, his father was not a writer, and the memoir is a testament to that fact. There is no overly flowerly language, no planned-out metaphors. The Pianist is simply a factual account of the mirculous events which lead to Wladyslaw Szpilman surviving first the Warsaw ghetto and later hiding out in Warsaw for years until the war ended. I learned quite a bit about l...more

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Aug 01, 2011 Corrinne rated it 5 of 5 stars

I had never watched the movie prior to reading the book and I can only imagine that it would be heart wrenching. Szpilman has a detached way of telling his story, although that is probably due to the fact that he wrote the book almost immediately after WWII ended, and it allows the reader to get through a good portion of the book without vomiting or crying (which would probably be impossible otherwise). The series of events through which Szpilman survived are astonishing and I imagine a level of...more

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May 21, 2011 Tania rated it 5 of 5 stars

I had seen the movie version and hadn't actually realised there was a book until I stumbled upon it at my local library. The movie made me cry. The book wrenched even more at my heart.

Wladyslaw Szpilman writes with an eery disconnect. It's all very matter of fact and that's what makes it so haunting. He wrote the book as a journal shortly after the war so the experiences were still fresh, so perhaps he was suffering some kind of shock and that's what makes it so compelling. The movie was beauti...more

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Feb 06, 2011 Cassidy Lebert added it

Wladyslaw Szpilman’s the Pianist was a truly remarkable story of one man’s survival. The vivid descriptions make you feel like you are actually hiding in the flats of the Warsaw ghetto alongside Szpilman. The torture in which the Jews had to endure is heartbreaking. Reading the conditions these people had to go through is horrible, yet eye opening to what life during this time of war was like. The emotion with in this novel jumps off the page
The Pianist is an auto biography of Wladyslaw Szpilma...more Wladyslaw Szpilman’s the Pianist was a truly remarkable story of one man’s survival. The vivid descriptions make you feel like you are actually hiding in the flats of the Warsaw ghetto alongside Szpilman. The torture in which the Jews had to endure is heartbreaking. Reading the conditions these people had to go through is horrible, yet eye opening to what life during this time of war was like. The emotion with in this novel jumps off the page
The Pianist is an auto biography of Wladyslaw Szpilman’s miraculous survival in the Warsaw ghetto from 1939-1945. Szpilman worked as a skilled pianist in the town of Warsaw with his family until the Nazi’s invaded and turned his world upside down. Wladyslaw, along with the other Jews in Poland were forced to follow degrading rules such as wearing the star of David on your clothing. If they failed to follow curfew or abide by a law they were shot on the spot. He tried his best to continue on with living a normal life, but the new conditions did not allow for a safe being. Matters turned for the worst when Wladyslaw was separated from his family during the deportations to the concentration camps, and instead watched them drive off to their death. From there on out Szpilman was dodging death. He escaped from the ghetto and began hiding in the flats of friends outside the city. While in complete isolation in the coverts of an attic, Szpilman began to think he was alone in the world, but luckily he met a German soldier who helps him step out of the shadows and face the world a free man once again.
The Pianist is an extraordinary novel I would recommend to an older audience. The violence and harsh reality of these times may not appeal to younger readers. I was moved with Szpilman’s story. Not only is this an amazing read, but it is also 100% true, making it a good source of history. After reading the Pianist I am very much interested in World War II. Although Wladyslaw lost everything he faced the world a new man, we can learn a lot from one man's struggles and perseverance.
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Oct 17, 2010 Susan Poling rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: wwii-hitler-judism, autobiography

A really good book. It shows a very vivid picture of what it was like to be jewish, hiding in the Warsaw ghetto during the German invasion. As he survives the loss of his entire family, the terror of German soldiers searching for him while he hides in the attic above the, as the building in which he is hiding burns around him, Wladyslaw also tells of how he kept himself sane during his 2+ years of hiding, how he survived a German work-detail, and of the few people who hid him and took care of hi...more

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Apr 26, 2010 Mr. Z rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: a-classroom-library, holocaust

“A boy of about ten came running along the pavement. He was very pale, and so scared that he forgot to take his cap off to a German policeman coming towards him. The German stopped, drew his revolver without a word, put it to the boy’s temple and shot. The child fell to the ground, his arms flailing, went rigid and died. The policeman calmly put the revolver back in its holster and went on his way.”

As sickening and infuriating as it is to read about horrific and cowardly acts like the one above...more

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Mar 11, 2013 Serena Liu rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Great book! I happened to watch the film first and then read the book. Although the film had some slight changes of the plot, it didn't affect me on reading the book and understanding Władysław Szpilman's miracle survival. I love both the film and the book at the same time. In fact, I was even more impressed by the journal confession of the German officer in the book that the audience couldn't obtain in the film. Wolf Biermann's Epilogue was even more compelling. The melancholy truth between a J...more

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Jul 28, 2011 Natalie rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: memoir, 5-stars

It took me a long time to settle into this book. It is heavy with narrative (which, I suppose, is one of the characteristics of a memoir), and I always find that hard going. Also, the writing seemed very dispassionate, which struck me as odd given the emotive subject matter, but as I got into the book I began to realise that the author was probably in a state of shock when he wrote it. The most harrowing events are exposed for what they are because they are not over-dramatised or embellished wit...more

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Mar 04, 2011 Jennifer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: own-it

This is one of those books that is difficult to critique because you don't want to come across as trying to comment on the experience. That being said, I appreciated the writing style. I found that it was honest and exact without being too sentimental or emotional in a situation that could easily be that type of writing. The moments of utter anguish and emotional pain came across as real and not overdone. Trying to convey those surreal feelings and experiences is not an easy feat and I found tha...more

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Jul 08, 2012 Claudia rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012-book-challenge-160-books, memoir

A powerful story told, not by a professional author, but by the man who suffered it. Wladyslaw was a successful pianist in Warsaw before WWII, a Jew, but unaware of the dangers that lay in his path. When Germany took over Warsaw, conditions changed day-by-day, hour-by-hour. The ghetto was created to isolate Jews, making it easier and easier to prey upon them. "Several centuries of humanitarian progress were to be cancelled out and we were back in the Middle Ages." Often, his story is more brutal...more A powerful story told, not by a professional author, but by the man who suffered it. Wladyslaw was a successful pianist in Warsaw before WWII, a Jew, but unaware of the dangers that lay in his path. When Germany took over Warsaw, conditions changed day-by-day, hour-by-hour. The ghetto was created to isolate Jews, making it easier and easier to prey upon them. "Several centuries of humanitarian progress were to be cancelled out and we were back in the Middle Ages." Often, his story is more brutal than that.

This was written, it seems, as a way to preserve his extraordinary tale of survival, and the prose is very dense...but the compelling aspects of his life make up for an awkwardness in the retelling.

I was taken by the little stories...the conflicts with his brother, his confusion about his sister...the people who helped hide him, the horrifying betrayals of his own people, thinking that collaborating with the Nazis would bring relief.

The two most touching stories involve Dr. Kroczak and a Nazi officer whose identity wasn't revealed until after the war.

Dr. Kroczak ran an orphanage within the ghetto...While 'his' children were forced to live there, he chose to stay in order to protect them the best he could. When the order came to ship all the children to a concentration camp, he chose to go with them. He had the children dress in their very best and they left for the cattle cars together with dignity. There's a monument to the doctor in Warsaw.

Wilm Hosenfeld was a teacher, a reluctant soldier, a German who was as trapped into his identity as Wladyslaw was. Hosenfeld saved Vladyslaw, gave him food and a heavy coat. He visited and kept Vladyslaw's spirits up. When Warsaw was 'liberated' by the Russians, Vladyslaw tried to find his rescuer, but they had deliberately never exchanged names. Hosenfeld was captured by the Russians and imprisoned, tortured, and he died in captivity.

I find it so amazing that this story hinges on two teachers, two men dedicated to finding the good in people, in children.

For months, Wladyslaw felt as if he was the only living person in Warsaw, often on the brink of starvation, knowing he must protect his hands in the hope that he'd survive the war and be able to play again. Because of Hosenfeld and other courageous people, Jews and gentiles, he did just that. He left a legacy with this book, a warning...intolerance is never right.(less)

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Apr 14, 2012 itpdx rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

A very compelling memoir of Szpilman's survival of the German occupation of Warsaw during WWII. Szpilman is a young pianist, a member of a middle class Jewish intelligesia family in Warsaw when Poland is invaded. The rest of his family is destroyed in a concentration camp. With the help of friends and finally a German officer he barely survives. This is one of the rare cases where I think the film (directed by Polanski) is as good as the book and adds to it. You will want to experience both.
For...more

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Aug 26, 2010 Rebecca Ahlquist rated it 4 of 5 stars

For some reason, I am drawn to Holocaust survivor stories. The Pianist is one of my favorites. Szpilman wrote this right after the war, so the tone of the story is muted, detached, and very matter of fact, as he was still reeling from his experiences. It is almost as if someone other than himself went through everything he describes.

The book is not written in strict chronological order. The beginning thrusts the reader right in the middle of Szpilman's life in the Warsaw Ghetto, and then goes b...more For some reason, I am drawn to Holocaust survivor stories. The Pianist is one of my favorites. Szpilman wrote this right after the war, so the tone of the story is muted, detached, and very matter of fact, as he was still reeling from his experiences. It is almost as if someone other than himself went through everything he describes.

The book is not written in strict chronological order. The beginning thrusts the reader right in the middle of Szpilman's life in the Warsaw Ghetto, and then goes backward to the beginning of the War as he recounts how he got to that point. The story then moves forward until Poland is liberated and he can resume his life.

Is Szpilman a hero? No. Does he do amazing things? Not really. Is he a particularly outstanding individual? Not at first glance. But that is what is compelling about the life of this man. He was a perfectly ordinary human being-with the huge exception of his musical talent-who is forced to deal with utterly extraordinary events.

And he survives. That is his amazing accomplishment. I think that is why I am drawn to these stories. Simply survival against monstrous odds.

There are times in Szpilman's story where he states that he gets a feeling or a thought that he heeds, and it ends up saving his life. Although there is no religious overtone to this story (unlike The Hiding Place) but as a religious person, I believe those are times when God was whispering to Szpilman. He grew to trust these impressions, and because of this he stayed alive.

This story is peppered with heart-wrenching scenes of loss, violence, incomprehensible cruelty, and deep sadness. But always Szpilman keeps going, moving ahead, fighting in his quiet way for his life.

I love music, and I think that is why this story speaks to strongly to me. In the end, his music literally saves his life, both as an anchor that he clings to during the bad months as Szpilman spends weeks alone in bombed out Warsaw, and near the end of the story when....well, you will have to read it to find out what happens!

A beautiful and compelling story.

As a side note to the book, a movie by the same name was made in 2002. It is a brilliant adaptation of the book. The actor who played Szpilman won the Oscar for best actor.

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Jul 13, 2010 Ali rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I saw the film that was made about this amazing story, which I thought was great bit of cinema, and yet somehow this understated book packs more of a punch for me. It is after all in the words of the man who survivied - against all odds. There is something about Wladyslaw Szpilman's telling of his story that is almost matter of fact - although that phrase conveys the wrong image - after all it was written in the years when he must have still been suffering physically and mentally from his ordeal...more

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Mar 31, 2013 Angeli rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, biography-memoirs, classics, favorites

I love how honest this book is. Living in the time of the second World War would never be an option for me, neither does living in Europe during those times, nor living in my country. It must really be hard and painful.

I can't imagine life this way. It's too tragic. Too many deaths, too many lives wasted, and too many blood shed.

Although I'm still not surprised that even then the elite class enjoyed themselves while the rest of their people were dying. It would have sucked to be poor, it would h...more

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May 07, 2013 Ana Isabel rated it 4 of 5 stars

Sempre tive enorme respeito por todos aqueles que passaram pelo período trágico da 2ª Guerra Mundial, principalmente os judeus, que foram explorados, torturados e mortos sem qualquer razão válida. Wladyslaw Szpilman foi um judeu com sorte, se se pode dizer, porque, apesar de ter perdido toda a família e passar por situações extremas de sobrevivência, escapou à morte inúmeras vezes. O mais interessante de tudo é que ele parecia mais preparado para a morte do que muitos dos que a viram nas mãos al...more

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About Władysław Szpilman

Polish pianist, composer and memoirist.
Szpilman is widely known as the protagonist of the Roman Polański film The Pianist , which is based on his autobiographical book recounting how he survived the Holocaust. In November 1998 Władysław Szpilman was honoured by the president of Poland with a Kommandor Order with a Star of Polonia Restituta.

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My Memories of You: Sixteen Selected Songs by the Pianist Wladyslaw Szpilman

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Quotes from The Pianist

“And now I was lonelier, I supposed, than anyone else in the world. Even Defoe's creation, Robinson Crusoe, the prototype of the ideal solitary, could hope to meet another human being. Crusoe cheered himself by thinking that such a thing could happen any day, and it kept him going. But if any of the people now around me came near I would need to run for it and hide in mortal terror. I had to be alone, entirely alone, if I wanted to live.” — 17 people liked it

“Lying is the worst of all evils. Everything else that is diabolical comes from it.” — 11 people liked it

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